


All the Love You Ever Get

by unbecomings



Series: Runnin' Down A Dream [1]
Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: F/F, Friends to Lovers, Idiots, Mutual Pining, Soul Bond, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-07-08 05:22:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19864183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unbecomings/pseuds/unbecomings
Summary: When Rose and Lindsey start dreaming together, it puts their friendship to the test.





	All the Love You Ever Get

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Snow Patrol 'What If This Is All The Love You Ever Get?' because, well, if she's your soulmate, this is probably all the love you ever get, isn't it? 
> 
> For clarification's sake, although I think I made it fairly clear, in this universe you and your soulmate can (and do) end up literally in each other's dreams.

It’s one of those dreams that feels so vivid that Rose is almost convinced that she’s awake, except that something’s not right. She can’t put her finger on what it is that’s not right, just that she knows none of it is real somehow even though it all feels real. Like, for example, it’s hot. Her thighs are sticking to the plastic swing. 

Also, she’s on a plastic swing.

“Why did you pick this?” Lindsey asks, because of course Lindsey is there on the playground too, on the next swing over. It’s the playground from Rose’s elementary school; they must have snuck in. 

“What?” Rose asks.

“This is weird,” Lindsey says.

“Yeah,” Rose agrees. She starts swinging. Lindsey watches her for a second but then she does, too, and Rose’s stomach turns over and over when she tries to watch Lindsey swinging instead of the ground, but she’s trying to see if Lindsey’s ponytail flies out behind her because then maybe it’s actually real and she’s just lost a week of her life or something. And that’s when she wakes up.

-

Her stomach isn’t turning when she wakes up. It’s not hot, either, and Lindsey isn’t there.

Mal is, though, when she goes into the kitchen, which is weird because Mal is usually the last one up. When Rose glances at the microwave clock she has to do a double take.

“Good morning sleeping beauty,” Mal says, “hate to tell you but the beauty sleep part didn’t work.”

“It’s nine,” Rose says.

“Yes,” Mal says, “and we have practice in an hour, so get your shit together.”

At practice she feels like she’s a step behind everyone else and she hates it. She has off days, they all do, but she can’t stop thinking about the stupid dream, turning it over and over in her mind as if that’s going to give her any answers. If it was _that_ kind of dream, wouldn’t she know? You’re supposed to know. You’re supposed to know in the dream, or maybe you wake up and then you know. Either way you’re supposed to be sure, and the only thing Rose is sure about is that Lindsey was in her dream last night.

It’s not like she doesn’t dream about her friends. But when she focuses she can still feel the plastic seat under her thighs and dreams that unsettlingly real are supposed to mean something.

She’s lucky enough that Mal is talking to Andi about getting engaged, so she can ask Andi about Drew without tipping anyone off that she’s thinking things over. 

“He was in my Calc class, and on the boys’ team,” Andi says, “so I knew who he was. I always thought he was cute, honestly.”

“That’s so cute,” Mal says. “Did you talk before?”

Andi shakes her head.

“Not really,” she says, “not like that. We talked a couple times, but we weren’t _talking_. I was busy, he was busy, I was never really thinking about dating someone until I dreamt about it anyway just because, you know, school and soccer.”

Rose knows. She’s done the same thing since she graduated because it just feels like a waste of time. You could be dating someone and then dream with someone else and have to start over all over again--if you wanted to be with your soulmate, anyway. There are plenty of people who avoid it, or stay with who they’re with. It’s not required. But why wouldn’t you want to be with the person you’re dreaming of?

“He came and found me,” Andi says, “in the library. I guess he’d seen me in the same spot before. I was gonna avoid him until after finals, but he was like, ‘I didn’t want to wait,’ which was really romantic actually.”

Rose tries to imagine Lindsey talking to her like that and can’t make it happen in her head.

“Did you ever wonder about it?” Rose blurts, “like before he came and found you. Was it like obviously the real thing or…”

Andi smiles and Mal puts her chin in her hands.

“Yeah,” Andi says, “I definitely knew. You just know. Like you wake up and you’re like, oh, yeah. That makes sense.”

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

When Lindsey wakes up, all the breath leaves her lungs at once. It feels like someone’s punched her. She rolls over to check the time and closes her eyes and when she opens them it’s still 8:30 and she definitely still dreamt about Rose.

The strangest part for her is that there’s not a single second where she’s surprised. It feels like the most obvious thing that could have happened. She sits up and hears Sonny bumbling around in the kitchen. When she makes it in herself she feels like a little kid on Christmas morning, and Emily definitely thinks something is wrong just from the way she looks up from her cereal, with her hair sticking in every direction and her eyes wide. Well, as wide as they get.

“What?” she says, “what is it? Did I get traded?”

“What?” Lindsey says.

“What?” Emily says.

“Is that like, an option?” Lindsey asks.

“Uh, I hope not?” 

Lindsey takes a deep breath and pinches her nose. Sonny dislodges her when she reaches into the fridge, back to being unconcerned. Lindsey purposely waits until Emily is pouring milk before she speaks again, just to see the real, unfiltered reaction.

“I dreamt about Rose last night,” she says.

Emily looks up, smoothly finishes pouring her milk, and caps it without so much as a squeak. 

“Did you?” she asks, in the same tone of voice that Lindsey’s mother uses when she says, ‘that’s nice.’

She sticks a spoon in her cereal and takes a bite, and Lindsey tries to decide what to do next. She doesn’t really want to have to explain it, she’s not ready to say it out loud, but it feels like Emily’s going to force her to and she’s considering not saying anything at all instead. Emily chews and stares at her until Lindsey squirms her way onto one of the bar stools.

“Like,” she says, “she was _in_ my dream.” 

It doesn’t do much in the way of clarification, but the way she says it must help. Sonny chews, and then she stops chewing. Her eyebrows come together in obvious suspicion, and she puts her bowl down.

“You’re really not funny,” she says, “I’m actually a little worried about how unfunny you are. I think you missed a critical stage in your development as a human.”

“Emily,” Lindsey says, “I’m serious.”

It’s the first name that does it. Sonny blinks at her and Lindsey feels like she needs to wash her mouth out with soap. It’s not that serious. Now she’s embarrassed, and she wants Sonny to stop staring at her.

“Wow,” Emily says, “actually, that makes sense.”

Lindsey nods, and Emily nods, and the relief is short-lived because the second Emily speaks again Lindsey feels stupid again.

“So what did she say?” Emily asks.

“Like in the dream?” Lindsey asks, but she knows that’s not what Emily meant. She reaches for her phone and there’s nothing, and when she looks up again Emily looks like she feels bad for bringing it up, which makes it all worse. Rose hasn’t said anything. She didn’t really say anything in the dream, either.

“She’s probably practicing,” Emily says, “I mean, we’re gonna be busy too, so I’m sure she’ll talk to you about it later. There’s no rush, right?”

Lindsey still feels like she’s running out of time.

-

Rose doesn’t say anything. Lindsey goes to practice and comes home and checks everything, even Snapchat, which she never uses anymore. Rose hasn’t updated any of her stories or anything, and Lindsey is suddenly a little afraid that Rose is dead or something until she re-checks Twitter and sees that Rose has been liking things in the last couple of hours.

“You could call her,” Emily suggests. Lindsey hadn’t even brought it up. They’re on the couch, they’ve been watching something for an hour but Lindsey has no idea what.

“Let’s play Mario Kart,” she says, and Emily doesn’t question it.

Halfway through Rainbow Road, Lindsey speaks again. It’s easier like this where she doesn’t have to look at Emily while she does it. It reminds her of coming out; telling her mom in the car in the last two seconds before she needed to get out of the car at school and bolting. 

“If it happens again tonight,” Lindsey says, “then I know it’s for real and I’ll call her when I get up, since she’s a couple hours ahead. But if not then it was probably just weird.”

“You think maybe she didn’t have the same dream?” Emily asks, like that’s not obviously what Lindsey’s saying. She’s not stupid, so Lindsey is a little annoyed that she has to actually say it.

“If she did then why didn’t she text me about it or call me or something?” Lindsey says. She runs off the edge of the track and has to start over, going from fourth to tenth place. Emily is still in first. By a lot.

“Maybe she was waiting for you to do it,” she says.

“No,” Lindsey says, “that doesn’t sound like her. But then even if it is that, if it happens again tonight I’ll do it anyway, so it’ll be fine.”

She was expecting--hoping, really--that Emily would see the logic in this and say so. Instead Emily ignores her and finishes the race in first place. She sits back and watches Lindsey try to finish with her arms crossed.

“Sure,” Emily says.

Lindsey pauses the game and throws down the remote. She’s felt like a dramatic child since she woke up, but never more than right now. She especially hates that Emily is the one who looks reasonable here, because Emily, as they all know, is the idiot in the house.

“ _What_?” Lindsey asks, and Emily raises her eyebrows.

“Nothing,” she says, “just weird that you’re like, avoiding it. Like, aren’t you supposed to be excited? You know who your soulmate is so now you can get together and stop wasting time, it’s supposed to be…”

“How would you know how it’s supposed to be?” Lindsey snaps, and Emily blinks.

“I guess I wouldn’t,” she says stiffly, and goes into the kitchen. Lindsey follows her immediately, her heart sinking. She’s on the verge of tears and pissed at herself for it, because she’s not the one who should be ready to cry. She’s been a disaster all day. Even if Rose did call her Lindsey’s not sure she’d be in any state to talk about it.

“Sonny,” she says, “I’m sorry, sorry, that was so mean.”

Emily reaches into the fridge and calmly retrieves a cheese stick, but Lindsey notices that Emily’s hands are shaking when she goes to unpeel it even if her face is completely expressionless.

“Whatever,” Emily says, “I mean you’re right, it’s not like I would know.”

Lindsey takes the cheese stick and opens it. When she hands it back, Emily immediately sticks half of it in her mouth without peeling it at all.

“That was really mean of me to say,” Lindsey says, “and I shouldn’t have and I’m sorry, I’m such a mess but I shouldn’t take it out on you.”

“Well, apology accepted since you opened this for me,” Emily says around a mouthful of mozzarella. 

Lindsey hugs her, and she waits until Emily puts down the cheese stick to hug her back. When she lets go she leans against the counter and closes her eyes. She can still see Rose swinging if she thinks about it.

“Did you think about it before?” Emily asks, “like did you already have a crush on her or was it out of nowhere?”

“I mean, we flirted,” Lindsey says.

“Weirdest foreplay I’ve ever seen,” Emily replies.

“I guess I was into her,” Lindsey continues, ignoring her, “but it seemed like...stupid. Like a waste of time because I was gonna dream about someone eventually.”

“And you never thought maybe you’d dream about her,” Emily says.

Lindsey hadn’t. Now she wonders if that’s the biggest tell, if that’s how she should know it was just a weird dream and not the real thing. Shouldn’t she know? If it was always Rose, shouldn’t she have felt that somehow, before this morning?

“No,” Lindsey says, “I guess not.”

“Well,” Emily says, “let’s see what happens tonight.”

Like she’s going to be there in the dream too. Lindsey almost wishes she would be.

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When Rose wakes up and realizes she hasn’t dreamt about Lindsey again, the first thing she feels is frustration. She takes a hot, angry shower and spends five minutes looking in the mirror and trying to explain the feeling. She should be relieved, because theoretically now she knows that Lindsey isn’t her soulmate. Maybe disappointed a little bit, because it also means she still has to wait to find out who _is_. She doesn’t feel either of those things. She’s just mad. 

Mad and unconvinced. There’s no rule that says you have to dream about your soulmate consecutively. She looked it up to be sure, and lots of times there’s breaks between dreams, sometimes even months. She had set an arbitrary goal to make herself feel better about the uncertainty and failed. It’s the failure that annoys her, because she knows she should just say something to Lindsey about it, but she can’t. It’s too embarrassing. And Lindsey had all day yesterday to say something and she hadn’t, which means something, either way. 

On the bus to New Jersey, Mal falls asleep half on Rose’s shoulder. Rose loses herself in her book, and she’s absorbed in it an hour later when Mal sits bolt upright fast enough to dislodge Rose’s headphones and scare the shit of her.

“Hey,” Rose squeaks, and Mal stares at her, eyes wide.

“I dreamt about a guy,” Mal says, “I’ve never seen him before.”

“That’s not possible,” Rose says, “your brain actually can’t make up faces, you only dream faces you’ve seen.”

“Shut up,” Mal says, slapping Rose’s arm. Rose hisses and rubs it, tugging her headphones away from her ears.

“I’m serious,” Mal continues, “like, a _dream_ dream. Oh my God, you have to help me find him.”

Rose is tempted to make a joke, but when she thinks about it she realizes how cruel it would be. Mal’s whole face is different, her eyes are so bright, it would be horrible to take that away from her. Rose can’t imagine what she’s feeling, but that’s not Mal’s fault.

“Okay,” Rose says, “tell me how to help.”

-

They spend the rest of the trip trying to figure out who he is. Mal says he was a baseball player, that his team wore red and navy and gray. They go through the entire Cleveland Indians roster before Mal remembers the Braves. 

Rose scrolls through until Mal gasps and points, and then she stops.

“Dansby?” Rose says, and then she can’t help herself. “What kind of a name is Dansby?”

Mal laughs. It starts as a giggle and builds until she’s laughing hysterically with her face tucked into Rose’s shoulder, and then Rose is laughing too because it _is_ ridiculous. 

“Oh my god,” Mal says, “that’s so stupid, I can’t believe I love him.”

Just like that. It’s that easy. It comes out of her mouth like it’s nothing. She lifts her head and looks baffled at herself.

“Wow,” Rose says.

“Wow,” Mal echoes, “that’s crazy. Oh my god.”

“It’s really,” Rose gestures, “fast.”

“Yeah,” Mal says, “I guess when you know, you know.”

That just about settles it. Rose doesn’t know anything. Maybe, if anything, she has a weird, halfhearted crush on Lindsey, but Lindsey never needs to know that.

-

Rose doesn’t text Lindsey. Not about the dream, not about anything. They win in New Jersey and Rose scores a brace, and on the second goal Mal jumps and Rose catches her, and for a second it feels like everything is exactly as good as it was last week. Mal scores the third one, the eventual game-winner, and after the game she holds up her phone for Rose to see.

She has an Instagram DM from the boy.

“Should I go to Atlanta?” she asks, practically vibrating with glee. “We don’t have practice until Wednesday.”

“Duh,” Rose says, and Mal squeals.

Mal texts the group chat, and that’s when Lindsey and Rose finally interact again. Rose makes fun of Dansby’s name and Lindsey ‘likes’ her text, and Rose smiles into her phone and is grateful that Mal is so zoned out that she doesn’t notice, because the whole thing is so stupid. Rose wants nothing more in the world than to Facetime Lindsey when she gets home, but she doesn’t do it. She goes to bed. And if she spends five minutes looking at Lindsey’s contact picture, fighting the urge to call her, before she goes to sleep, that’s not something anyone needs to know, either.

-

This time they’re in Lindsey’s bedroom.

“Fuck,” Rose says, and Lindsey jumps, twisting around from where she was sitting at her desk with her laptop open. 

“Oh,” Lindsey says, “you’re here.”

“It’s your dream,” Rose says, “isn’t it? I mean, it’s your room.”

“I don’t know,” Lindsey says, “I mean, it is, but--doesn’t it have to be our dream? Collectively?”

“Not if you’re not real,” Rose says.

Lindsey twists around and crosses her arms. 

“Who has an office chair in their bedroom?” Rose asks, sitting cross-legged in the middle of Lindsey’s bed. She’s annoyed at Lindsey for no reason, and annoyed at herself for wanting to launch herself across the room and into Lindsey’s lap.

“It’s not my room,” Lindsey says, “it’s Sonny’s office like, most of the year, she just put a bed in here for me.”

“What the fuck does Sonny need an office for?” Rose laughs, and when Lindsey laughs with her it feels good and normal.

“Memes,” Lindsey says. When she looks at Rose, Rose remembers it’s a dream again, and her chest gets tight. This means something. She doesn’t want it to, but it does. 

“We play in Portland next,” Rose says. 

“Yeah,” Lindsey says, “I know. But you have a bye week first.”

Rose doesn’t ask why Lindsey knows that. She’s decided that this has to be her dream. The real Lindsey would never look at her like this, like a puppy, expectantly. She’s making this up for herself, and if she’s doing that then it makes sense that dream Lindsey, as attentive to Rose as she is, would know her schedule inside and out. 

“Guess I’ll see you soon then,” Rose says.

“Hopefully before then,” Lindsey agrees. She flexes her hands on her knees and Rose is watching her fingers when her alarm goes off.

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“Honestly,” Emily says, “you should talk to Tobin.”

“No,” Lindsey says immediately, “this isn’t her problem, no way. It’s fine. I just--I thought you should know. I don’t know. It’s fine.”

“Shut up,” Emily says, “you were right, I don’t know anything about this stuff, but Tobin does and you know she’d die before she told anyone about it. There’s like zero risk involved in talking to her about it and I guarantee you she’ll be less annoying than I am.”

That’s how Lindsey ends up sitting in Tobin’s car after practice, cooling off with the air conditioning on blast. Tobin reaches into the backseat and produces a pair of bananas. She hands one to Lindsey, who feels as if she really has to take it. It’s not like Tobin asked her if she wanted it. It was a gift.

“So,” Tobin says, “what’s up?”

“I think I’m dreaming about someone,” Lindsey says, toying with the stem of the banana, “but I can’t tell if it’s the real thing or just a weird series of stress dreams.”

“Well,” Tobin says, “for starters, it would have to be a really weird and specific series of stress dreams.”

Lindsey nods. When she doesn’t say anything else, Tobin continues.

“Honestly,” she says, “it’s different for everyone. It’s not like it is on TV all the time. Even if you do know it’s the real thing, it’s not necessarily as easy as it sounds. Chris and I were dreaming about each other for like a month before I said something about it.”

That’s something Lindsey didn’t know, but now she wonders if Emily _did_ know. Tobin and Christen are--she can’t imagine one without the other. 

“Why didn’t you?” Lindsey asks. Tobin takes a bite of her banana, chews, and swallows. She leans her head back against the headrest and thinks on it.

“It was embarrassing,” she says. “I didn’t even really know her yet. She was brand new on the national team. And it’s not like she said anything to _me_. For at least two weeks I was like, I’m totally making this up. But actually, I think I could tell, in person especially. Things were weird. Like when you get static electricity charge from walking in carpet and you’re about to reach for the doorknob and you can tell right before that you’re gonna get shocked.”

Lindsey doesn’t say that she’s always felt like that around Rose, but it’s true.

“That doesn’t sound pleasant,” she says instead. Tobin laughs.

“It wasn’t,” she says, “it was weird. It was super weird. I didn’t want it. Like, at all. I just wanted to play soccer, but I couldn’t play soccer and avoid Chris, so I was always gonna have to talk to her about it. I think I also thought she was going to turn me down.”

It’s definitely a possibility. Lindsey actually can’t imagine things going any other way, now that she thinks about it. She can’t imagine Rose wanting her, which is probably why she hasn’t brought it up.

“She’s almost definitely going to turn me down,” Lindsey says.

“You don’t know that,” Tobin says, “and you won’t until you say something. But also, even if she does, at least then you’ll know. Right? This is the worst part. Not knowing is the worst part.”

Lindsey doesn’t say anything for a while. She eats her banana instead, and thinks about the last dream, the one in her room. When she woke up she reached for the spot on her bed where Rose had been sitting, and when there was nothing there she’d had trouble going back to sleep. The way Rose had looked in her in that dream is the way Lindsey wants Rose to look at her next weekend. Admitting that helps.

“What if I say something and it ruins everything?” she wonders out loud. It’s not a real question for Tobin, but Tobin answers her like it is. She turns and smiles at Lindsey, who tries to smile back and knows that she’s failing.

“What if it doesn’t?” Tobin asks, and there’s really no comeback for that.

-

“I still can’t tell if you’re really here,” Lindsey says. Like always, it’s as if she’s been dropped into the middle of a conversation. It’s not like she walks into a room and sees Rose; they were already here on a bench together, presumably talking about something. There’s just the bench, nothing else, but Rose is there in perfect detail.

“Well it’s a dream,” Rose says, “so that’s a pretty easy question to answer.”

“Shut up,” Lindsey says, “you know what I mean.”

Rose lets her knee drop until it’s pressed against Lindsey’s, and Lindsey feels it. Because it’s a dream, and because she still doesn’t know if Rose is actually there, she feels brave enough to put her hand on Rose’s knee. Rose looks at her and Lindsey is half expecting her to say something mean, but instead she smiles, and Lindsey smiles back, feeling like a giddy idiot.

“I know what you mean,” Rose says, “but there’s no way to tell. I don’t think you’re really here, I think you’re saying that you’re not sure _I’m_ real because my subconscious is trying to convince me that _you’re_ real. But I think I’m cool with that.”

“Honestly,” Lindsey says, “I didn’t follow that at all.” She’s still thinking about her hand on Rose’s knee.

“I figured you wouldn’t,” Rose says.

“Are you calling me dumb?” Lindsey asks, and Rose is supposed to laugh, but she doesn’t. She rests her chin in her hand, elbow propped up on the arm of the bench.

“No,” she says, “i just think you don’t care as much about whether this is real as I do.”

“You just said it wasn’t real,” Lindsey says, “you’re going to give me a headache. If I wake up with a headache--”

“Stop talking,” Rose says, “I’m gonna kiss you.”

Lindsey blinks and takes her hand back.

“Why?” she asks, because she can’t help but be suspicious.

“Because,” Rose says, shifting to face her, “I want to and you’re not really here, so I can do it in a dream and it won’t ruin anything.”

“It’s not going to ruin anything,” Lindsey says, and then it occurs to her that she probably should have said that she _is_ there, but there’s no way for her to prove it and Rose has definitely made up her mind. 

Rose places her hand on Lindsey’s chest and shoulder, her thumb dipping just under the collar on Lindsey’s t-shirt. In a real dream- a fake dream, a _dream_ dream- that detail wouldn’t exist and Lindsey wouldn’t be able to feel Rose exhale against her mouth. But she can. And she definitely feels it when Rose kisses her.

Lindsey kisses her back, because it’s a dream and it can’t hurt her. After a few seconds she reaches for Rose’s face and then feels like that’s too much and settles for her shoulder. It’s a really awkward position to kiss in, but the kiss isn’t awkward at all. 

She wakes up in a cold sweat to what she thinks is her alarm, but when she rolls over it’s 5:00 am and her phone is silent. Still, she can remember the sound of an alarm, and it takes her a few seconds to realize she must have heard Rose’s.

She has a headache.

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“You’re really quiet,” Mal says, when they settle into their hotel room in Portland.

“I’m tired,” Rose says.

Because when she woke up from the dream about kissing Lindsey she refused to go back to sleep. She technically had an extra hour, but the risk was way, way too high. What if she went back to sleep and it happened again? What if she went back to sleep and her subconscious actually did launch her into Lindsey’s lap? She can’t have a dream about full-on making out with Lindsey right before having to play against her, she’ll have a meltdown. And they need to win.

She’s not about to let her weird, intense crush on Lindsey get in the way of winning. 

“Take a nap,” Mal suggests.

“No,” Rose says stubbornly, though she knows she’s going to have to sleep eventually. It’s not actually a bad idea, now that she and Lindsey are in the same time zone. If she takes a nap and dreams about Lindsey, then they’re just dreams about her having a crush on Lindsey, not soulmate dreams. Unless Lindsey is also napping. There’s no way to know.

“Weirdo,” Mal says, and Rose doesn’t bother arguing.

-

They win. Barely. 

Rose would have preferred to be the one scoring the game-winner, because she needs the personal victory, but it’s still a win. She can’t count on one hand the number of times she’s made eye contact with Lindsey on the field, to the point where she’s relieved when the whistle blows because she doesn’t have to keep physically being in Lindsey’s space if she doesn’t want to. She’s not even sure why it’s bothering her so much, except that Lindsey is being weird. 

Or maybe she’s making that up. Maybe she’s the one being weird because of the stupid dream, and Lindsey is just picking up on it. Rose _wants_ it to be that Lindsey is being weird, because that would mean that the dreams are real. 

So it’s probably just her. 

In the handshake line her heart beats faster every step closer she gets to Lindsey, until she thinks she’s going to pass out. She still thinks she’s making it all up until she gets there and Lindsey takes her hand, and then, the second Lindsey touches her, she knows it was all real.

Part of how she knows is just what it feels like to touch Lindsey at all. All of the tension she felt when they kept making eye contact is magnified and every single hair on her body is on end. She has goosebumps. Lindsey holds on a little bit too long.

“Good game,” she says, quietly and sincerely. They’re holding up the line but Rose doesn’t want to let go. She’s trying to figure out what color Lindsey’s eyes actually are. She’d always thought they were blue, but now she’s not sure.

So, Lindsey is her soulmate.

Rose has never been so relieved to get picked for the post-game press conference, because it means that she’ll miss Lindsey, and she needs the space. She checks her phone just in case Lindsey has decided to talk to her about the whole thing, but she’s not surprised there’s nothing there. Aubrey does most of the talking and Rose answers the questions that are directed at her and picks at the label on her water bottle. She does her best not to think.

She doesn’t succeed until she leaves the room and Lindsey is waiting outside, and then all the thoughts leave Rose’s head immediately and she stands there like an idiot, blinking, until Lindsey speaks. 

“Let’s go get Chipotle,” Lindsey says. Her hair is still wet. She probably shouldn’t be standing around in the air conditioning with wet hair and no jacket.

“I think there’s food at my hotel,” Rose mumbles, shoving her hands into her sweatshirt pockets so that she doesn’t reach for Lindsey and give into the impulse to tuck Lindsey’s hair behind her ears. Rose’s palms are _itching_ with all these new impulses to reach out and touch Lindsey, and it makes Rose especially twitchy that Lindsey doesn’t seem like she’s struggling with the same thing.

“I’m sure,” Lindsey says, “but it’s not Chipotle, which is around the corner...so c’mon.”

Rose doesn’t notice Mal until it’s too late and Mal’s arm is already around her shoulders. Lindsey smiles stiffly at Mal, who doesn’t even remotely notice that something weird is going on. There’s a lot of movement in the hallway suddenly, and Rose feels exposed, like they’re all gonna know just from looking at her.

“I want Chipotle,” Mal says, “let’s get Chipotle.”

“No,” Rose and Lindsey say in unison, and Mal pouts. Emily pops up behind her and Rose feels a pit of dread in her stomach when she realizes they’re not going to be alone at all, so no matter what it is Lindsey was getting ready to say they’re going to have to wait, again. If she’s going to get dumped, she’d like to get it over with.

“We’ll go to a different Chipotle,” Sonny says instead, “a better one.”

When she steers Mal away from them, Rose realizes that Lindsey must have talked to her about the whole thing, and it makes her suddenly and viciously jealous that Emily got to hear about Lindsey’s feelings before she did.

-

“So,” Lindsey starts. She doesn’t finish the sentence, just says it again: “so.”

Rose mixes up her burrito bowl with her fork and refuses to look up, on the off chance that feeling like she’s on the verge of tears is more involved than just her being hungry.

“Please don’t ruin Chipotle for me,” she says, as calmly as possible, “I really like Chipotle.”

“If the e.coli outbreak didn’t ruin Chipotle for you, nothing will,” Lindsey jokes, and Rose does look up, just to make eye contact while she shoves a forkful into her mouth. Lindsey is eating, too, because the outbreak didn’t scare her, either. 

“Don’t dump me in Chipotle,” Rose says. She tries to say it like she’s joking, because that makes it easier, but Lindsey doesn’t play along. Her face softens and then she draws her eyebrows together in confusion, prodding her salad.

“You can’t dump someone you’re not dating,” she says.

“Please stop before Chipotle tastes like disappointment for the rest of my life,” Rose says, and Lindsey smiles weakly but she does, finally, stop trying to have a conversation for a few minutes. When Rose looks up again she notices that Lindsey’s hand is shaking, and it hits her like a ton of bricks. Lindsey had seemed so _fine_. But maybe she’s not.

“Hey,” Rose says, putting her fork down, “are you okay?”

Lindsey laughs. She hasn’t eaten much, now that Rose is paying attention.

“No,” Lindsey says, “I woke up at five...with your alarm. And then I couldn’t go back to sleep.”

“My alarm wakes you up?” Rose asks, and Lindsey shrugs.

“It did this time,” she says, “I don’t know. I always wake up right after we--I don’t know if it’s because it happens towards the end of when you’re sleeping, or...anyway, I’m just tired.”

“You can call me,” Rose blurts, and Lindsey looks up and blinks at her, registering nothing.

“Next time,” Rose says, “if you can’t sleep, you can call me. I didn’t sleep either.”

“I thought you didn’t want to be bothered with it,” Lindsey says, “or--I don’t know. I couldn’t figure it out. Before last time I thought you just didn’t want to talk about it. But then--you know.”

“But then I kissed you,” Rose finishes, because if she says it out loud it theoretically should feel like less of a big deal. It doesn’t. She has butterflies. Lindsey blushes, and Rose realizes she’s smiling.

“Yeah,” Lindsey agrees, “I think that’s when I knew I wasn’t making it all up.”

Rose watches Lindsey fold her napkin over and over until it’s the size of her fingernail.

“I think I always knew,” Rose says, “I was just scared.”

She’s still scared, thinking about what’s next. Is she supposed to kiss Lindsey now, in real life, in person? Are they dating now? How are they going to make it work across the country? How are they supposed to be together and compete against each other? Should one of them try to get traded?

Lindsey looks up at Rose, and Rose comes to a decision: her eyes are definitely green, not blue. Something about her mouth is so cute; Rose can’t put her finger on it but she can’t stop thinking about biting Lindsey’s lower lip now.

“You’re scared of me?” Lindsey asks. Rose’s kneejerk impulse is to say no, but she takes a breath first and does her best to be honest.

“I was scared you were going to dump me at Chipotle,” she says, and it’s kind-of-not-really a joke.

“I know you better than that,” Lindsey says.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Lindsey walks Rose back to her hotel. She’s feeling better but not better enough, like she’s two minutes rom a huge weight being lifted off of her chest but she’s still not completely, one hundred percent convinced that she’s awake, or that Rose--

Well, she knows Rose is her soulmate, but it doesn’t feel real yet that Rose _wants_ that to be true. They’re not talking while they walk, which is weird enough as it is. She wants to know what’s going on in Rose’s head. That’s what she’s thinking about when the backs of their hands brush, and then it’s like Tobin said it would be, a shock all the way up her arm. 

“Are you gonna hold my hand?” Rose asks, and it should come out like she’s chirping, but instead she sounds kind of shy. Lindsey’s chest aches with how much she loves it. For a moment she fumbles, their fingertips brushing, and then she threads her fingers with Rose’s and takes her hand for real.

There’s a lot she wants to say, but for the first time since the first dream, Lindsey doesn’t feel rushed. That lasts until they stop in front of the hotel, and then the nervousness creeps back, and she knows she’s making a ridiculous face. 

Just like in the dream, Rose kisses her first. She reaches up to touch Lindsey’s cheek with her free hand, her eyes bouncing from Lindsey’s lips to her eyes and back again, and then Rose leans up and Lindsey tilts her chin down and they’re kissing. It’s better than in the dream. Rose is soft and she means it and Lindsey isn’t afraid to touch her, winding her arm around Rose’s shoulders to keep her close. Even when she breaks the kiss, Rose lingers, smiling against Lindsey’s cheek. 

“You better dream about me,” Rose says.

“I will,” Lindsey promises.


End file.
